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07/18/2013

The marketplace offers an array of technologies designed to mitigate cooking fires, considered the leading cause of home structure fires and associated injuries in the U.S., per an NFPA report. Despite the options, a number of factors have prevented widescale implementation of these devices in U.S. households.

Placing this issue on the figurative front burner, researchers have begun a series of analyses seen as the first step in bolstering the use of these technologies. The Fire Protection Research Foundation, for example, is overseeing testing aimed at eventually producing standardized fire scenarios and performance test methods for cooking-fire mitigation technologies. Underwriters Laboratories, Eastern Kentucky University (EKU), and the Consumer Product Safety Commission are conducting similar research.

"Important parts of the fire world are focusing on cooking fires in order to limit them," EKU researcher Corey Hanks told NFPA Journal in a recent feature story highlighting the new research. "Finally, we're seeing more of a push."

Get the full story in the July/August issue of Journal, and watch the following video of Dan Gottuck from Hughes Associates talking about the Research Foundation study: